


Sick of Laying Down Alone

by theswearingkind



Series: Five Times The Blackhawks Didn't Date Hockey Players (And One Time They Did) [2]
Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-18
Updated: 2013-04-18
Packaged: 2017-12-08 19:41:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,312
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/765254
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theswearingkind/pseuds/theswearingkind
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Just as Jared’s about to make his move, though, this other guy comes up and throws his arm around the hot guy’s shoulder.  “Tazer,” the new guy says, laughing into hot guy’s neck in the way that only people straddling the edge between sober and drunk ever do, “Tazer, babe, I missed you, man, where’d you go?”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sick of Laying Down Alone

**Author's Note:**

> This entry in "5 Times..." is less lolzy than the Abby/Patrick one - in fact, I feel kind of bad for starting the series off with that one, since it's pretty different than all the others. PS, they're all told from the POV of the person dating the various Blackhawks players. 
> 
> Warnings for underage drinking.
> 
> Title from Adam Lambert's "Fever."

Jared’s baby sister turns twenty-one on a night he happens to have off from work, so he ignores her glares and invites himself along for her big celebration. He knows he’s not exactly a punishment to look at—he fucked his way through half of the closeted frat guys at Urbana-Champaign, and those guys didn’t risk getting outed for just anybody—but he’s not kidding himself that he got the looks in the family, either; he’s good-looking enough, sure, but Jessa is a level of hot that makes his all his straight guy friends and every lesbian he knows go stupid when she comes around. And she knows it, too, has been putting it to use for herself since she grew out of her awkward phase around the time he graduated from undergrad, so fuck if he’s going to let her too far out of his sight on the first night she’s able to do legally all the things that he prefers to believe she’s never done before. She’s all grown up now, maybe, but she’s still the kid he used to carry around on his shoulders while she wore the Green Ranger costume he’d outgrown years before. 

Still, it is her twenty-first, and there’s almost a full decade between them—enough time that, from her perspective, it’s probably a little bit like partying with their parents, so Jared does his best to hang back once they get to the bar. She’s traveling in a roving pack of five or six girls, a couple he recognizes from pictures in her apartment, most he doesn’t, and they meet up with a group of guys who seem harmless enough, for now. Jessa and her friends grab a booth—“Oops, doesn’t look like you’ll fit, Jare, sorry,” she says blithely, and she’s not sorry at all, the little shit—and he ends up taking over a vacant stool at the bar; it’s far enough away to keep him from actually being an overbearing douche, but close enough that he can keep an eye on her. 

The bar itself isn’t half-bad, either, more of a sports bar than anything else; Jared thinks they’re planning to go to an actual club later so that they can dance, but for now it’s still pretty chill. There are a few televisions showing replays of the day’s games, and Jared nurses a beer while he watches a recap of the ‘Hawks game from earlier in the day. He’s never been much of a hockey person, but a few of the guys at work are, and they’ve started making noises like the team’s going to be worth something again in a couple of years. 

The replays have cycled on to college basketball—now there’s a fucking game—when someone taps on the bar next to him and asks, “Uh, is this seat taken?” The guy looks like he’s a few years younger than Jared—probably a little _too_ young, honestly, more in Jessa’s range than his, and he’s been trying to cut down on the young ones ever since he and Eric split up—but he’s hot enough: tall and semi-built, but a little gangly, still, the way Jared like them best. Not that he’s assuming anything, really, just noticing; if the guy fucks men—and there are a hell of a lot of other seats at this bar, so Jared’s thinking it’s a pretty solid bet that he does—then Jared would probably be into it. 

“Help yourself,” he replies, gesturing toward the bar stool with his longneck. The guy shoots him a smile as he sits, and shit, yeah, Jared would definitely be into that.

“Thanks, man,” the guy says, shifting forward to flag down the bartender. “Three Philosophers, please,” he orders, and Jared’s impressed. He likes that beer—it’s a good brew, but not the kind of thing a person would order just to impress somebody; Jared bar-backed enough years to know the difference. There’s no way the kid’s 21, but the bartender just raises an eyebrow and says, “Glad to have you in Chicago,” before passing it over, which is—weird, yeah, but something maybe worth exploring if they end up getting out of here. 

Jared watches the line of the guy’s throat move as he takes a long pull off the bottle, then the guy cuts his eyes back toward Jared, and yeah, he’s busted, caught looking, and it’s only the little bit of a smile on the guy’s face that keeps things from getting awkward fast. 

The guy takes another swallow of his beer and shifts a little on his seat, moving just enough that his knee bumps into Jared’s. Jared drops his eyes to where the guy’s lips are wrapped around the neck of the bottle, thinks about getting his dick in there, and feels himself harden a little bit inside his jeans. 

He really wasn’t planning on hooking up tonight, though; he was just coming along to keep an eye on Jessa and her friends, maybe to pick up the tab for a couple of rounds so that it seemed like less of an intrusion. Still, this kid’s hot, and it’s been a while—six weeks, give or take—and Jared’s only human. He glances back toward Jessa’s booth one more time, just to check on her; they’re on what looks to be their second or third round already, getting a little loud and letting the guys lean in closer, and shit, it’s not like he should be cock-blocking his sister on her birthday, anyway. 

Just as Jared’s about to make his move, though, this other guy comes up and throws his arm around the hot guy’s shoulder. “Tazer,” the new guy says, laughing into hot guy’s neck in the way that only people straddling the edge between sober and drunk ever do, “Tazer, babe, I missed you, man, where’d you go?” 

That’s a fucking disappointment, to say the least; it figures that the guy—Tazer, apparently; kind of a weird name, but Jared wouldn’t have minded saying it a few times tonight—would have a boyfriend, and that he’d be the complete opposite of Jared in every way: short, small, blonde. Tazer just laughs, though, and shrugs the other guy’s arm off his shoulders. 

“Got tired of watching you fail at picking up, Kaner,” Tazer replies easily. “She was way out of your league, anyway.” Tazer cuts his eyes back toward Jared, lifts just the corner of his lips in a smile, and oh, that’s promising. 

Kaner makes a dismissive noise, something between a huff and a snort. “Please, Johnny, I wasn’t even trying. Besides, she wasn’t that hot. Did you see the chick who came in a little while ago?” 

“Not really my area, Kaner,” Tazer— _Johnny_ —says, switching focus back to his friend but leaving himself open toward Jared. It’s pretty much a done deal, now, Jared’s thinking, so he shifts his foot forward and hooks it around Johnny’s ankle, pushing up just a tiny bit until the leather of his boot makes it past Johnny’s jeans and hits the bare skin of his calf. He rubs his foot up and down, just a bit, and smirks when Johnny swallows hard, twice; Jared might be getting kind of old—that’s what Jessa tells him, anyway—but he’s still got moves. This one is going to be fun, if they ever manage to get away from his friend.

They do get away, eventually, and Jared’s right: Johnny is fun, in a weird, serious way. They end up fucking around for a couple of months, actually, and it’s always fun. Johnny sleeps over at Jared’s apartment a few times, but it’s never serious—the kid is 19 and plays hockey for a living, how could it be?—and when Jared runs into Eric again after work one day, that’s pretty much that.


End file.
